Elon Musk: 'It's likely we're living in a simulation and Pong is proof'

SpaceX and Tesla boss Elon Musk has revealed his plans to put humans on Mars, how he feels about Apple's electric car plans and even his views on whether we're living in a simulation.

Speaking at the Code conference organised by ReCode, Musk said that "according to the plan, [we] should be able to launch people [to Mars] by 2024, with arrival in 2025".

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This prediction builds on SpaceX's recent announcement that it hopes to launch its first unmanned missions to Mars in 2018. In doing so, the company will become the first commercial provider to send a spacecraft to the Red Planet.

The 44-year-old, when asked if he wanted to travel into space, said he'd probably be going into orbit within four or five years but stressed this is different from going into space itself. Although, when quizzed about if he'd like to travel to Mars, Musk said he doesn't have a "Martian death wish".

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For those that will potentially colonise Mars in the future, Musk did have some advice. He said a government on the planet should be a direct democracy. "Most likely the form of government on Mars would be a direct democracy, not representative," he said. "So it would be people voting directly on issues". This, in the billionaire's view, would be the best method to stop corruption.

In the slightly more bizarre line of questioning, the Tesla boss said there is a "one in a billion" chance that we're living in a base reality, rather than a simulation.

He said: "The strongest argument for us being in a simulation probably is the following: Forty years ago we had pong. Like two rectangles and a dot. That was what games were."

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"Now, forty years later, we have photorealistic, 3D simulations with millions of people playing simultaneously and it's getting better every year. Soon we'll have virtual reality, augmented reality."

Musk also said one potential project he could be involved in the future could be "neural lace". This, according to an explanation by Gizmodo is a device from science fiction that "futuristic post-humans" grow with their brains.

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Any potential device would involve a wireless brain-computer interface that allows neutrons to "release certain chemicals with a thought". Some scientists have already been working on a basic prototype but there would be a long way to go until any device becomes a reality.

Getty Images / Noah Berger

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The entrepreneur, who was also appearing at the event alongside speakers including Amazon's Jeff Bezos, and Bill and Melinda Gates, also claimed Google won't be able to compete with his car and battery company Tesla on producing self-driving cars.

Google has been publicly runnings its self-driving car project since around 2008 and has a number of models it is testing. The company says it has more than 1.5 million milesdriven across a number of US states including California and Texas.

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Tesla's own efforts include rolling-out self-driving features – in the form of an autopilot mode that can park, and make a car change lanes – to its Model S vehicles over the past year.

"Google's done a great job at showing the potential of autonomous transport, but they're not a car company," Musk said at the conference. Continuing, he said the Alphabet-owned company would "potentially" licence its technology to other companies. "I wouldn't say they're a competitor," he said.

Instead, the PayPal creator said he saw Apple as more of a "direct" competitor. Apple hasn't formally acknowledged its work on a autonomous vehicle but documents obtained by The Guardian have shown the iPhone maker has plans under the name of Project Titan.